One of the Germans’ favourite pastimes is lying on the beach in the sun and swimming. This passion has its roots in Mecklenburg. In 1793, at the recommendation of the duke’s personal physician, Heiligendamm was founded as the first German coastal spa town with a sanatorium. Numerous quite magnificent Neoclassical-style houses bear witness to the era. In 1996 they were sold to an investor who is now trying to turn Heiligendamm into a fashionable seaside health resort again, which will include a golf course and a Grand Hotel.
The trouble is, the weather isn’t as reliable as on the Côte d’Azur. Another drawback is that Heiligendamm attracts curious locals and “normal tourists” who simply want to “have a look at the rich”. But that’s probably nothing new either. No doubt the local farmers and fisherfolk considered the sight of bathing aristocrats equally bizarre over a hundred years ago. After all, for centuries they had been accustomed to building their houses away from the sea, protected from the wind. And swimming? That would never even have entered my great-grandmother’s mind.
The writer Uwe Johnson (1934–1984) penned the most beautiful description of Mecklenburg between 1930 and 1968: “Jahrestage” – almost 2000 pages long. He came up against difficulties as a writer in the GDR and left in 1959. But his view of the federal republic had always been detached and critical as well. “Where I came from doesn’t exist any more”, says Gesine Cresspahl, the novel’s main character, during a stay in New York. And there was definitely some truth in this. Even so, Uwe Johnson spent his lifetime writing exclusively about Mecklenburg, even when he was living in America or in England. But on another occasion his Gesine also says: “The fisherfolk’s country is the most beautiful country in the world”.
And I’ll endorse that. I recommend a walk from Ahrenshoop to Wustrow along the cliffs, with the sea lying smooth and blue, or whipped up by the wind from dark grey to green. And when autumn comes the buckthorn shimmers on the cliffs with its silvery leaves and orange berries. And without realizing it, you’ve gone from Western Pomerania (Ahrenshoop) to Mecklenburg (Wustrow).
When I’ve been in Berlin long enough, I escape again to the north – to the cliffs of Ahrenshoop, to the lake at Schwerin or I hop on the ferry to the island of Hiddensee. There I happily stay for a few days, simply inhaling the tranquillity – and I’m at home.
